LETTER XXIV.
HISTORIANS OF CAEN--TOWERS AND FORTIFICATIONS--CHÂTEAU DE LA GENDARMERIE--CASTLE--CHURCHES OF ST. STEPHEN, ST. NICHOLAS, ST. PETER, ST. JOHN, AND ST. MICHEL DE VAUCELLES.
(Caen, August, 1818.)
France does not abound in topographical writers; but the history and antiquities of Caen have been illustrated with singular ability, by men to whom the town gave birth, and who have treated their subject with equal research and fidelity--these are Charles de Bourgueville, commonly called the Seigneur de Bras, and the learned Huet, Bishop of Avranches.
De Bourgueville was a magistrate of Caen, where he resided during almost the whole of the sixteenth century. The religious wars were then raging; and he relates, in a most entertaining and artless manner, the history of the events of which he was an eye-witness. His work, as is justly observed by Huet, is a treasure, that has preserved the recollection of a great variety of the most curious details, which would otherwise have been neglected and forgotten. Every page of it is stamped with the character of the author--frankness, simplicity, and uprightness. It abounds in sound morality, sage maxims, and proofs of excellent principles in religion and politics; and, if the writer occasionally carries his naïveté to excess, it is to be recollected that the book was published when he was in his eighty-fifth year, a period of life when indulgence may reasonably be claimed. He died four years subsequently, in 1593.--In Huet's work, the materials are selected with more skill, and are digested with more talent. The author brought to his task a mind well stored with the learning requisite for the purpose, and employed it with judgment. But he has confined himself, almost wholly, to the description of the town; and the consequence is, that while the bishop's is the work most commonly referred to, the magistrate's is that which is most generally read. The dedication of the former to the town of Caen, does honor to the feelings of the writer: the portrait of the latter, prefixed to his volume, and encircled with his quaint motto, "L'heur de grace use l'oubli," itself an anagram upon his name, bespeaks and insures the good will of the reader.
The origin of Caen is uncertain.--Its foundation has been alternately ascribed to Phoenicians, Romans, Gauls, Saxons, and Normans. The earliest historical fact connected with the town, is recorded in an old chronicle of Normandy[[71]], written in 1487, by William de Talleur, of Rouen. The author, in speaking of the meeting between Louis d'Outremer, King of France, and Richard Ist, Duke of Normandy, about the year 945, enumerates Caen among the good towns of the province. Upon this, Huet observes that, supposing Caen to have been at that time only recently founded, it must have acquired importance with much rapidity; for, in the charter, by which Richard IIIrd, Duke of Normandy, granted a dowery to Adela, daughter of Robert, King of France, whom he married in 1026, Caen is not only stated as one of the portions of the dower, but its churches, its market, its custom-house, its quay, and its various appurtenances are expressly mentioned; and two hundred years afterwards, Brito in his Philippiad, puts Caen in competition with Paris,
"Villa potens, opulenta situ, spatiosa, decora,
Fluminibus, pratis, et agrorum fertilitate,
Merciferasque rates portu capiente marino,
Seque tot ecclesiis, domibus et civibus ornans,